The traditional system for providing drinking water in offices, factories and homes includes a cabinet like drinking water dispenser for holding in the inverted position a five gallon glass or plastic bottle. Water flows from the open neck of the inverted bottle into a well portion of the dispenser from which, upon demand, the water flows by gravity through a conduit to a faucet actuated by the user seeking drinking water. Typically, one or more five gallon bottles are placed by the delivery person adjacent to the dispenser cabinet so that as one bottle is depleted it may be dismounted from the dispenser and a full bottle weighing about 45 lbs. may be mounted with a lift from the floor, and inverted into the dispenser cabinet. It is well known that a substantial effort is required to lift 45 lbs. from the floor to a position about 31/2 ft. there above and to invert the bottle. Persons of modest strength have difficulty completing the task of raising and inverting the fill bottle of drinking water but nevertheless, it must be accomplished periodically. The labor to deliver the containers to the place of use is considerable. The investment in transport equipment to carry the refill containers is substantial.
Generally, the filled bottle of drinking water is closed by a removable cap which is stripped away from the neck of the bottle usually by the person reloading the water dispenser. While lifting, it is convenient but unsanitary for that person to place his/her hand on the bottle neck after the cap is removed. This has been an occasion of the drinking water becoming contaminated from germs from the hands. Presently, there is no way to safeguard handling the water refill bottle in a germ free condition so as to protect the drinking water from contamination. Further, when the empty bottle is removed from the dispenser well for a period of time, air borne materials could settle into the well and afford yet another point of contamination of the drinking water.
The traditional system for providing drinking water with respect to a dispenser cabinet requires that the water bottles be transported from the water bottle filling plant to the customer. Then the bottles are returned to the plant in the empty state. The two way transport in handling of rigid bottle accounts for a substantial amount of the cost and capital in a commercial drinking water delivery system. It would be highly desirable if the drinking water could be delivered and the container therefore retrieved in a compact state and sent on for recycling. The same conditions hold for other human consumable liquids and even syrups and condensed liquids such as coffees or teas, milk and the like.
In the prior art the usefulness of a pouch for holding a resupply of chemical additives, viscous soaps, industrial metal cutting lubricants or the like was recognized. The U.S. Pat. No. 4,322,019 to Smith discloses a pouch containing a viscous liquid soap for refilling liquid soap dispensers. There is no particular need in that or other applications for maintaining these liquids in an aseptic condition being that those liquids are not intended for human ingestion. The principal concern then was to maintain control over the liquid against leakage during the refill operation. Providing a seal over the neck of a water bottle wherein the seal is pierced during installation into a water cooler is shown in the Wagner U.S. Pat. No. 1,142,210. Avoidance of undesirable skin contact with a liquid contained within a pouch or sachet is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,288,178 to Johnson wherein an attachment is provided to the bottle to be filled, the attachment serving to penetrate the pouch so that the corrosive liquid may drain without human contact into the associated bottle. None of the prior pouch systems showing membrane puncture or adapter structure therefore were intended and designed to be used in an aseptic drinking water delivery system.